If you could compare the first edition of this textbook with this current eighth
edition, you would recognize the chapter titles. However, you would also
... [Show More] notice the
expanded coverage in this new version. The first edition featured one chapter titled
‘‘Perceptual Processes,’’ whereas the eighth edition includes separate chapters on
perceptual recognition and on attention. This earlier edition had a single chapter on
language, but the current edition has one chapter on language comprehension and one
on language production. The most dramatic comparison focuses on memory. That
first, 1983 edition of Cognition featured just one chapter, in contrast to three chapters
in this current eighth edition: Working Memory (Chapter 4), Long-Term Memory
(Chapter 5), and Memory Strategies and Metacognition (Chapter 6).
The field of cognitive psychology is also changing in important ways. Three of
these changes are particularly relevant in the current decade: (1) connections with other
perspectives; (2) research in biopsychology; and (3) applying cognitive psychology in
the ‘‘real world.’’ Let’s consider these topics in more detail.
Connections with Other Perspectives. John Cacioppo wrote a thought-provoking
article in his role as the president of the Association for Psychological Science,
the organization that would include the largest number of cognitive psychologists.
According to Cacioppo (2007), psychology has long been a discipline with distinctly
separate fields. For example, some social psychologists, cognitive psychologists, and
biological psychologists might believe that they have little to offer each other. As
Cacioppo wrote,
The important point here is that each perspective has substantive implications
for the others in the pursuit of comprehensive psychological explanations. The
in-depth study of any one of these perspectives is essential, but a comprehensive
understanding of the mind and behavior is likely to be achieved by an integration
of what we know and can learn across multiple perspectives. (p. 50) [Show Less]